“My dream is to save them from nature.”
So, apparently, said Monsieur Dior.
And his first scent, the marvellous Miss Dior, was the highly abstract, crisp and green aldehydic chypre that was the sensation of its day, a refreshing post-war antidote to the idea of woman as flower. In its original form, this was a lush, complex, and very poised blend that managed to be womanly without even a hint of sweetness, like a sharply-tailored tweed suit. The keen-edged aroma that you experience as you first apply the perfume comes from a vivid, racy blend of green galbanum; clary sage; bergamot and fresh gardenia petals, on a spiced, and unfloral, heart of rose, jasmine, muguet, carnation and orris, and it is one of those dastardly well constructed scents that brilliantly radiate out these ingredients so you experience each soloist in turn – yet never out of step with the whole ensemble. Dark, musky depths of mosses, patchouli and woods finish the scent with a lingering suggestiveness and a touch of leather, and it is this quality, the combination of a masculine accord with the crisp fresh florals of the top, that gives Miss Dior its unique allure.
A touch kinky.
The Black Narcissus 
I rather like this perfume. It takes me back to my twenties when I was a keeny local bell-ringer! Our vicar’s wife – God love her – wore this resolutely! It takes a certain sort of lady to wear this. It is not unpleasant on the nose, and a good staple.
Interesting way of putting it. I remember a girl I knew at King’s College Cambridge, a rather pretentious, yet quite interesting flapper-like girl called Marge carried it off stunningly. She smelled bitchy and chic and smacking of good taste (all of which was true about her to a large, Marge, extent).
I love Miss Dior even though it is not loveable per se. On me it smells ATROCIOUS; the synthetic gardenia over moss n’animal simply does not work in the least. And yet: I do love sniffing at my extract once in a whiley.
Lord! She sounds a character! Are you a Cambridge man then? How marvellous. I do love a good punt.
It’s funny: I could never think of myself as a ‘Cambridge Man’ and it seems very strange to see it written down for some reason. It was the most intense, and one of the most beautiful times in my life and I do delve into the memories sometimes, but would hate to relive it.
And the very first time I went punting, with the white shirt, the wine, the dappling sunlight through trees, we found a dead body in the river! Sheer horror: a student that had killed himself. That told me that punting wasn’t for me somehow.
As for Marge, she was part of a fashionable ‘set’, and Miss Dior smelled crisp and intoxicating on her….
Neil! What a sad story. I never knew that about the body in the river. How awful. Very sad for the poor student, and distressing for you to find his body. Wonderful as Cambridge was in so many ways, it was a place of extremes and stresses. An intensely beautiful time in many ways as well, with some wonderful people of course, but I too would not relive it. I couldn’t watch Carols from King’s for about 6 years after leaving – brought up a massive conflict of joy and sorrow. I feel suitably at a distance from it all now to appreciate its beauties whilst recognising its inherent crazinesses too. As for Marge – I remember her fondly. x
It was a time of searing beauty; searing, really, in so many ways, but I think I was not equipped to deal with it!
If i may interject for i too am a childus cantabus. An airy sprite far out in the glades of Girton, so not at the throbbing hub of the collegiate cauldron, but – Me neither! i was not equipped to deal with it! But then I wonder if anyone really was? Perhaps it was the nature of the place anyway to take us as its raw material, to melt us down, to beat and fashion us into strange burnished peculiarly glowing and not very practical oddities…and how beautiful! And thank fuck for it, when all’s said and done! Hideous and terrifying as some aspects of it were -and I did take Cambridge off my CV for a time when I got my second degree, so keen was I to disassociate – in time, I’ve come to feel very positive about what it gave and also what it demanded of me. But it’s not a picnic, however many bowls of strawberries, cream, pimms and lemonade one stuffs down ones gob.
!!!!!!!!!!!! Perfectly put, Signorina Cantabriana!
Reblogged this on The Black Narcissus.
I came by a vintage sample of this and remember being surprised and excited by the leather drydown. I am minded to dig it out now and see where it takes me this time…;)
It is surprisingly filthy, actually, and smells DREADFUL on me. I once made the mistake of dousing myself in the vintage parfum and having a lesson with a rather staid Japanese woman and I felt embarrassed throughout.
I like it on a woman. The kink comes from precisely the oppositions in the scent; the leathery mossiness, and the odd clary sage galbanum in the top. It is a very intelligent perfume in my view, and one that sharpens your attention.
I wore Miss Dior in the edc splash as a teen, and I had the spray edt in my 20s. It seems funny now that I should be attracted to such an odd scent at a young age (odd for the bitterness that offset the florals), but we didn’t have tooty fruity & celeb scents when I was young. Miss Dior made me feel elegant and grown up and sophisticated, which is how I wanted to feel, not like a perpetual teenager. The quality of the edc and edt in those days was superb. I have no idea what liquid they’re labeling “Miss Dior” today and I don’t want to find out (sob!).
I am going to tell you anyway. The last time I looked, it was a brand new perfume called Miss Dior, pink, with a big bow on it, but the strange thing was that it did have some reminiscences of the original perfume, just dressed up in fruitchouli. If that sounds monstrous, then you are probably right.
I can imagine it smelling gorgeous on a young girl, actually. Really enigmatic. It would also smell great on a more experienced woman, though. I think it is a highly sexual perfume despite its deceptive aspect of brisk prim.
I have the original extrait and EdT of Miss Dior and find it absolutely intoxicating. so sophisticated and “put-together”, the way a certain polished woman should smell. I find it to have dirty bits to it, but they really blend so smoothly and seamlessly together there is never any harshness to it.
As for what they now sell as “Miss Dior”, bouf! I can not bear the thought of it. thank heavens for my vintage lovelies.
Dearest Ginza
Student deaths and scent.
Someone threw themselves of the top of the engineering tower on my first day at university. Al lectures cancelled as we couldn’t get to our department.
Without meaning to be flippant, I never really recovered the idea that anything at college was compulsory at all after that.
I adore the original and (fairly original) versions of Miss Dior. I’ve always seen it as a Western Saloon scent all false propriety and Parisian fashions on top all holsters and knickers that come down for dollars underneath.
They still sell a version of it under the ‘Originale’ tag here, though I’m not sure if that’s a world wide thing. The pink stuff’s just ‘Cherie’ remixed and given a grander title – flanker becomes pillar in the industry terminology. Handmaiden usurps queen in mine.
Yours ever
The Perfumed Dandy
When I worked one top of a mountain, in Lake Louise, a friend of mine wore it. She was Japanese, and she wore it in an unusual way-she loved fragrance but hated it on her skin. So she purchased an vintage styly locket, which had a filigree sort of facade. She then perfumed a cotton ball with Miss Dior, and put the cotton ball in the locket. It seemed the epitome of chic to me, and it smelled wonderful on her.